


A Thousand Years

by AndromedaPrime



Category: Transformers - All Media Types, Transformers: Prime
Genre: Fluff, M/M, Post-War, Slow Dancing, Song Lyrics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-01
Updated: 2019-08-01
Packaged: 2020-07-28 21:34:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,482
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20070940
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AndromedaPrime/pseuds/AndromedaPrime
Summary: “A thousand years?” Megatron asked, chuckling. “I didn’t believe the humans could live such long lifespans. A thousand years, and a thousand more, as she says.”“For them, it is an exaggeration.” One of the edges of the Prime’s lipplates quirked upwards, giving him a half-smile. “For you and I, it has been far, far longer than that.”





	A Thousand Years

**Author's Note:**

> I've been screaming about MegOP and slow-dancing for the past couple of days, so my many thanks to Unicron and auri_mynonys for putting up with my yelling, yelling _with_ me, and overall just enabling the hell out of me.
> 
> Yes, these two tragic bots are dancing to "A Thousand Years." No, I am not a Twi-hard. I took most of my inspiration from the piano/cello version that The Piano Guys performed, which I will link at the end of the fic if anyone has not heard it. I hope you all enjoy what was born out of this <3

When he arrived home, he didn’t find Optimus in his usual spot for this particular hour.

His beloved had a schedule he preferred to stick to. When they’d first begun to cohabitate, he’d asked Optimus why he wanted this schedule - there was no longer a war going on, and he had no army of Autobots to tend to.

Optimus told him that he preferred the schedule to give him some semblance that he was still doing something that mattered. If he were without even a sort of rudimentary structure, he said, he would feel lost. And if there was something that he hated, it was feeling lost.

Megatron supposed that he could understand. No. Not supposed. He  _ could _ understand. 

He felt lost himself, without an army to command. The war, fighting against the mech he now proudly called his bonded, his beloved, his sparkmate (among many other terms of endearment), had so consumed his mind and soul and frame that he forgot what it was like to be without that looming threat of battle.

No, Optimus wasn’t there, wasn’t on his favored cushion seat with a datapad in servo and a serving of energon at his side. Megatron blinked and reset his optics before he fine-tuned his audio receptors, listening for any noise, searching for the other life force in this little abode of theirs. 

Optimus was in the library. If they could call the small secondary room with barely enough space for a desk and a few shelves a library. Had Optimus not been in the berthroom, he would have checked the library as his second option.

Making his way past the piles of datapads and old books that lined the corridor - and making a note that he would have to find more shelves to organize these things a bit better - Megatron placed his servo on the handle of the door and let it slowly open before him.

They were a long while yet from the grand and opulent library that Optimus had mentioned he’d love to have one solar cycle. Something not like the Hall of Records, but something like in an Earth film he’d seen, a bookish human woman shown a grand library by a beastly figure. Megatron had half-derisively said that they did not have the space for something of those grand proportions, but in the deepest part of his processor, he’d taken that little bit of information and stored it away. It would one day come true, a surprise for his beloved.

Much like the surprise that awaited him as the little room came into full view, revealing the gently swaying form of Optimus Prime as he held his helm up a little high in the air. His optics, the light of Megatron’s life, were closed.

There was nothing sensual about the movement. It was a gentle and slow process. Light and slow movements of the pedes, and oh, Optimus had his arms raised and positioned as if he were holding onto someone else. He moved with such grace, and oh how beautiful he was. And if Megatron listened closely, he swore he could hear something playing, perhaps from the Prime’s radio speakers.

He smiled and watched for a moment longer, and then when Optimus turned so his front faced Megatron instead of his back, he took the opportunity. Megatron gently wrapped his arms around his bondmate, pulling their chestplates flush together, and most definitely took some joy in how Optimus’s electromagnetic field suddenly flared out, surprise woven in the static, and crashed over the both of them. He went absolutely still, and he stared up into Megatron’s optics with wide, bright optics of his own.

If Megatron were a betting mech, he would have bet that Optimus’s processor was having a hard time trying to reboot.

“Primus all around,” Megatron said with mirth in his voice, smirking, “you are a wonderous thing.”

He could see Optimus’s surprise and shame percolating in his processor. Primus, he was so lucky to have a mate such as this. He slowly leaned down and gave his bonded a light kiss on the lipplates. “No welcome home comment?” he asked teasingly.

Optimus blinked his optics and that seemed to reorient his processor. “You’re back rather early from Iacon,” Optimus replied quietly. “I didn’t anticipate your return for another cycle.”

“Is this what you do when you don’t anticipate my return for a while?” the old warlord asked with a laugh. “Sway around the library as if no one is watching?”

“Until this moment, I believed no one  _ would _ be watching me.” Optimus pulled back from the embrace and gave Megatron a gaze that made the old warlord laugh again instead of putting a seed of shame in his processor, which Megatron assumed was the intent. “How much of it did you see?”

“Not much, perhaps a klik. But it was enough to prove to me just how endearing everything about you is.”

A fan kicked up in the room. It took a moment for Megatron to realize that it was Optimus’s frame trying to cool him down. There was another opportunity for teasing. Megatron gave the Prime another mischievous smile. “Oh my, Optimus. Did I embarrass you, or are you simply happy to see me?”

He was met with a withering gaze. “I was happy to see you, until you embarrassed me.” But in that withering gaze, he saw a bright twinkle of the Prime’s optics. Just as he could never stay mad very long at Optimus, it seemed Optimus wasn’t able to hold onto his own anger as well.

“There is no reason to be embarrassed,” Megatron rumbled, reaching for Optimus again. He paused and waited for his bonded to give his assent, and when it was given, he pulled the other mech in close and pressed his lipplates to Optimus’s elegant helm crest. “You move so divinely. What was it that you were doing?”

He heard a soft whine come from Optimus’s vents before the Prime sighed. “It is called dancing.”

“Oh? Dancing. It looked more like a graceful sway, and you looked the master of it.”

“You flatter me, my love. I have much more to practice before I can hope to be graceful, as you say.” There was a small smile on Optimus’s face now, and as always it made Megatron’s spark leap a little bit, in joy. 

“I will take your word for it, beloved one,” Megatron murmured. He grasped one of Optimus’s servos and brought it to his lipplates, kissing the dark metal and then kissing each of the Prime’s digits, smiling as Optimus’s optics brightened.

He gently tugged on the Prime’s arm, leading him out of the library and into the common room, where there was more space. Optimus fell into his arms, pressing himself against his broad chassis, and leaned up to give him a soft peck on his lipplates.

For a brief moment, Megatron had to wonder what their armies would think of such displays of affection between the both of them. Once sworn enemies, now bonded, rekindled relationship that a gladiator and a data clerk had once wanted, yearned, dreamed about. Some solar cycles, when the sun rose over the horizon and sunlight streamed through their windows, Megatron would wake and look to his side, and smile in combined relief and disbelief that the mech smiling back at him was the one he’d loved all along.

Megatron leaned down and kissed Optimus too, smiling against the Prime’s faceplates. He’d go offline before he would ever consider thinking that kissing his bonded was a tired and boring activity.

Something in Optimus’s electromagnetic field changed a bit, and when he drew back, he noticed how the other mech glanced outside. Before he could ask what was on Optimus’s processor, he received his answer.

“I do have one thing to ask of you before we retire to berth. If you will be willing to come outside with me.”

Megatron smiled softly. “Anything for you.”

Optimus measured him with a steady gaze, and then reached out and grasped one of his arms, gently tugging him out of the back door.

Nightfall had commenced, and the sun was almost done setting over the horizon. The landscape that stretched out into eternity had a faint line above it that was varying shades of vibrant purples and reds, while the expansive sky above them was already black, with stars emerging from the blanket of the universe.

The lights from far-off Iacon twinkled to the west, sparkling brilliantly. The only reliable light sources they had close by were their own biolights, the light from a single room in their home that shone out of a window, and the stars above.

Resetting his vocalizer, Megatron gazed around the backyard, taking in the sight of the mountains at night. How they loomed in the distance, almost ominously - if it weren’t for the bright, friendly twinkling of the stars above their helms. “What are we doing out here?”

“What I was doing, has been something I’ve been wanting to try with you, if that is alright.” His beloved’s voice sounded a tad nervous. “It is a form of dancing. Specifically, the humans call it a slow dance,” Optimus said softly, as he took one of his bondmate’s servos and clasped it gently in his, intertwining their digits.

Primus, he would never get so used to this. Megatron glanced down at the other mech’s blue optics, feeling his spark flare outwards in a burst of affection. It was quite a strange feeling for him. It was becoming all too common now, but for so long he’d lived with his spark so closely guarded that to let another one in was very unfamiliar.

“And what does this slow dance entail, pray tell?”

Optimus’s optics brightened, and the edges of his lipplates quirked upward for a fleeting moment. “It is rather simple compared to many of their dance routines. The humans do it quite frequently at their bonding ceremonies, and variously at social gatherings for their younglings.”

Megatron scoffed a little bit, but it held no malice or mocking. Of course. Of course it was the humans. “Somehow, I’m not surprised that the humans gave you the idea. You fell quite hard for that little planet.”

The response from Optimus was a sweet smile, and oh how Megatron loved that smile, would do anything he reasonably could - and some things unreasonably - to keep that smile on his beloved’s face. “If you looked hard enough, I have a feeling you would find something worthwhile on Earth, had you stayed.”

Old and stubborn warlord that he was, Megatron smiled back. “I think I rather enjoy Cybertron more. It is home. Broken, but it is where you are,” he used his free servo to brush his digits against Optimus’ faceplates, spark fluttering as the other mech leaned his helm into the tender touch. For a moment, he could see a flicker of Orion Pax in the faceplates beaten down by millennia of war. “And where you are, is where home is.”

Optimus went still for a moment. Their mingling electromagnetic fields betrayed the emotions that the old Prime felt and tried to keep hidden. When Optimus slightly ducked his helm and tore his gaze away from Megatron, the mech could tell by the shivering of the air around Optimus’s faceplates that he was a little heated there.

His beloved, his bonded. How beautifully he moved and spoke and how beautiful everything about him just was. 

“I do not say this as mere flattery,” Megatron said quietly, gently moving his servo to tilt Optimus’s face up towards him again, looking into the other mech’s optics. “You know well what I came from.”

“Yes,” Optimus replied, smiling softly. “Yes, I know.” He gave the warlord a wan smile, and then moved the servo away. He paused, and then sighed, straightening his posture. “Two partners will arrange their servos like this,” Optimus said gently, taking Megatron’s other servo into his and placing them on the curve of his hips. “One will rest their servos on the hip joints of the other one, and the other one,” he trailed off for a brief moment, voice softening as he loosely wrapped his arms around his mate’s neck, “will drape their arms around the neck of their dance partner.”

Megatron looked down the very small difference between their heights and couldn’t help leaning down and kissing his sparkmate. Optimus looked quite taken aback for a moment before chuckling softly. “Stop that. You’re distracting me.”

He gave the red and blue mech one of his winning, sharp smiles. “I am nothing if not a pleasant distraction, wouldn’t you agree?”

“Quite a distraction,” Optimus replied a little dryly. He adjusted the loose grip his arms had on Megatron’s neck, moving his servos to the broad shoulder struts. “Alright, stop. I am serious this time. Keep your servos on me. And once the music begins to play, they begin moving their pedes in synchronization with the other, like so.”

Optimus guided them around, and when their pedes met in a clumsy overlap, Optimus would stop them and nudge Megatron’s pede to where it needed to be, or moved his own if he were the offender. 

The look of intense concentration on his sparkmate’s faceplates, illuminated by the combined red and blue glow of their optics, only served to make the old warlord think of the times that a gladiator would sit and stare at his little data clerk as if he were the most beautiful sight to behold. The same little frown that Orion Pax had on his faceplates when he checked Megatronus’s speeches for clarity and consistency had never gone away.

His spark reached for its partner. Optimus would never consent to such a public display, so Megatron did the only thing he could, and moved one of his servos from the Prime’s hips to play with one of the helm fins.

It twitched and Optimus turned his gaze upward again, narrowing his optics. “I’m sorry to be boring you.”

Boring him? Never. Megatron moved his servo to hold that wonderful face that was the cause of many dreams and many nightmares. “My beloved,” he rumbled softly, “you could never bore me.”

“Then please,” Optimus gently trod on one of Megatron’s pedes - it had to be intentional, he thought - and gave him a sharp glare, “stop distracting me. I would appreciate it if you paid attention.”

The definitely-intentional step on his pede drove home to Megatron that this was something he’d need to take seriously, for it mattered so dearly to his beloved. Putting on his best solemn and serious face, Megatron nodded and made a quiet noise of apology. 

Optimus gave him a glare, which then softened as he started over once more. Megatron let himself be led around on the ground, a little more knowledgeable this time about how and where to step. 

The stars moved overhelm, in tandem with their pedes. The single light that had been on in their home shut off due to lack of activity, leaving them in near darkness, if it weren’t for the stars and the brightness of blue optics.

“When you were dancing in the library,” Megatron murmured, his red optics dimmed as he tilted his helm a little to the side, gazing intently at the other mech, “you were listening to something as you swayed. What was it?”

An expression of uncertainty fell over Optimus’s faceplates, and he turned his helm away so he stared off to the side. Megatron wanted to look, but he knew nothing was there to look at in particular.

“It was music,” Optimus replied after a few moments. “Something that I heard on Earth that I felt was so beautiful that I took a recording.” He looked back up at him, and Megatron fell in love for the fourth time that night cycle, with the way his Prime looked at him. “I enjoy listening to it when it is quiet, and I can actually feel what it is conveying.”

Rumbling softly in his chassis, Megatron made a small motion with his helm that was almost like a nod. “May I hear it?”

Another moment of silence. Then, there in the Manganese Mountains that existed long before the birth of their race and that would exist until long after they were all gone, a tinny speaker crackled to life. It was quiet at first, making Megatron think that only Optimus would have been able to decipher any lyrics and the exact tempo of the sound file.

Then, the music became a little clearer. Sweet, slow, melodic. There were no words, but the instruments were so masterfully played that it seemed to elicit emotions from his sparkmate. Optimus’s faceplates shifted in minute fashion, in ways that would be indecipherable and unknowable to anyone else that looked at him, but Megatron knew far, far better.

“Since you are far more knowable in these things than I am,” Megatron rumbled quietly after a few more moments of their gentle sways and steps, “how do the humans make such wonderful noises?”

At that moment the music crescendoed, and was then followed by a very brief pause. His beloved smiled and, when the tune began playing once more, said, “Methods and instruments vary greatly. In this one, the instruments they use are called a piano and a cello. The piano is this one playing at this moment.”

Piano. The sensations it gave were of droplets from a rainstorm, plinking onto his armor over and over again. It was cheery and peaceful. The little plinks of the piano felt like gentle footsteps. It reminded him of the mornings he was the late one to come online from recharge, and how he would lay in berth while listening to the gentle and calculated footfalls Optimus made outside as he bustled around while trying not to wake a mech already woken.

It was the sensation of his spark when he looked upon his sparkmate, admiring from a distance, thinking of just how much he loved him.

Another type of sound came into play, briefly. Instead of cheery and peaceful little steps, it felt like a movement in time.

“That is the cello,” Optimus said quietly, closing his optics and lifting his helm a minute fraction.

Cello. Movement. It was how Megatron felt when he caressed that small face that once belonged to a data clerk to whom he would have given the world. A face that now, after eons of war, belonged to a Prime that he would gladly destroy the entire universe for, if Optimus would only ask. His spark tugged towards the other, smaller mech.

The cello was the gentleness and beauty of his sparkmate’s movement through time and space, as he danced alone, then danced for him alone.

He didn’t know how to verbalize his feelings. Primus, most of the time he didn’t know how much to convey to this frustrating, wonderful, damned, gentle and intelligent and  _ beautiful _ mech just how much he loved him. But this, right here, Optimus showing him the human custom of slow-dancing and looking at him like he was his reason for living, certainly made an already-hard endeavour that much harder.

_ If only you knew just how much I love you _ . He’d said it before, a gladiator to an archivist.

Before he could say anything more, the music picked up tempo again and it only felt right to sway Optimus around. The Prime made a surprised noise, but he recovered quickly, falling into step with him.

“There is another version of this tune where a human sings of how long she has loved her partner,” Optimus said, smiling, a slightly faraway look in his optics.

Words? Megatron was intrigued. “Do you have that one as well?”

The instruments changed their tune, as if they were being played by different hands with different skill. A gentle voice floated into the air.

_ All of my doubt suddenly goes away somehow / One step closer _

Oh, the look that Optimus gave him. One of intense longing that was bared for him to see visually, instead of tucked into the deepest recesses of a spark that only he could feel. When they were together, among others, Optimus was the far more stoic one of the two. Little did everyone know just how much their Prime hid from them.

He paid attention to the lyrics, and then smiled. “A thousand years?” Megatron asked, chuckling. “I didn’t believe the humans could live such long lifespans. A thousand years, and a thousand more, as she says.”

“They do not live that long,” Optimus replied, changing his tone and seeming rather serious now. “Their true life spans at best are, perhaps, eighty years. Some may be able to live to a hundred, though that is only a tenth of a thousand. To live a thousand years is a wish.”

Primus. Sometimes his precious old Prime was far too literal. Megatron simply adjusted his arms around the other mech and gazed into his optics. “Eighty. Primus. They don’t live long at all.”

“Indeed, they do not.” A weary look came over the Prime’s faceplates, which then turned to a pained one. “Jack, Miko, and Rafael are already at, or around, half their expected lifespans. It pains me to think of the short lives that humans live.”

This was where Megatron would normally have given such a snarky response, about how the humans weren’t meant to live very long, possibly for a reason. Instead, he simply pressed his forehelm against his mate’s, and gave him a small smile. 

Optimus returned the smile, gentle and beautiful, as in everything he did. 

A thousand years, truly? Those were but a few blinks of optics in their long, near-eternal lifespans. He had loved Optimus since time immemorial. He had fallen so hard for the little data clerk upon their first meeting, taken by the smaller mech’s bravery and genius and earnestness. It took some time, but he knew it wasn’t much later that Orion Pax had developed feelings for a brutal gladiator, loving him like he was his reason for living.

A thousand years. They had known each other longer than that before they went from data clerk and gladiator to Prime and warlord. Then again, he supposed that singing “a million years” was far too much of an exaggeration, even for humans.

His bondmate gave him a look that showed that he’d clearly seen all the thoughts in his processor through the amusement in his optics, as Optimus sighed softly over the strains of the music. “For them, it is an exaggeration.” One of the edges of the Prime’s lipplates quirked upwards, giving him a half-smile. “For you and I, it has been far, far longer than that.”

Megatron gave a pleased hum and caressed the back of his bonded’s helm with the tips of his digits. “Indeed. But when I am with you, time does not matter. I have had so long with you, yet there are cycles I feel that we met only a short while ago.”

He didn’t know which one of them was the first to cease dancing. When they did, Optimus reached up and took his helm into his servos and brought him down, kissing him as the strains of music continued playing, and the voice crooned to her lover once more.

_ Every hour has come to this / One step closer _

Megatron wrapped his arms around his mate possessively, growling low in his chassis as Optimus gave a soft, pleased noise, and held onto his shoulder struts. One of Optimus’s legs came to rest between his, steadying them both.

His spark bloomed, making him feel the exact way he felt so long ago when they first looked into the other’s optics and saw something there that they both wanted. A gladiator tenderly meeting a data clerk’s fiery kiss halfway, whereupon they knew they could not be apart for the rest of their life cycles.

_ And all along I believed I would find you / Time has brought your heart to me _

Optimus leaned up and moved his lipplates to Megatron’s audio receptor, a light brushing over the metal. Megatron could feel the gentle smile on his beloved’s faceplates as that wonderful voice whispered with the music, “I have loved you for a thousand years. I’ll love you for a thousand more.”

One of the Prime’s servos moved from holding onto his helm to laying flat on his chassis, and the Prime gave him a serene smile. “Four million years of war,” he continued, a heavy weight of regret in his voice. “And here we are. Acting like we once did in the Pits and the Hall, at the start of a revolution.”

How the universe had mocked them the entire time, ensuring they would battle for a long time, even by the standards of Cybertron. Never parting from the other, always still on that quest to convince the other to lay down their weapons and join their side. Everywhere they turned, the other was there.

Megatron would not have had it any other way.

The music gentled, and the singer crooned again.

_ One step closer / One step closer _

Megatron took Optimus’s helm into one of his servos, gently tilting his helm upwards. “As a wise Prime told me on the solar cycle we ended a war,” he rumbled quietly, “the best time to make peace was four million years ago. The second best time is now.”

The other mech’s optics brightened. He kissed him again. Optimus laid his helm briefly on the nearest of Megatron’s shoulder struts before looking up at the stars twinkling and twirling above them. How much Megatron loved that look of awe and wonder that Optimus so often had, when it was simply the both of them.

“It is rather late. Do you wish to retire to berth?”

Following his gaze up to the stars that had been born before they were and would continue to twinkle for years untold, the old warlord and gladiator shook his helm. “The stars are almost equal to your beauty tonight.” He grinned at the Prime and took some pleasure in the fact that he could still make the old data clerk so flustered. “I would like to stay here for a little while longer.”

Slow-dancing lessons over for the night, Optimus Prime sat on the ground, gently pulling Megatron with him. Wrapping his arms around his beloved once more, Megatron kissed one of the Prime’s finials.

_ And all along I believed I would find you _ _ /  _ _ Time has brought your heart to me _

Optimus turned his helm in towards him and leaned up, giving him a light peck on the side of his helm, humming contentedly.

_ I have loved you for a thousand years / I'll love you for a thousand more _

**Author's Note:**

> [The Piano Guys version](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QgaTQ5-XfMM)
> 
> [Christina Perri original](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UkBHCse8Xho)


End file.
